Ask Old Jules: Happiest time, What is man, Reason for belief in God, Unpredictable life, Eye of the beholder

Old Jules, what was the happiest time in your life?

May, 1965, until today. At the tender age of 21 I was fortunate to have what’s sometimes been called a ‘white light’ experience, which provided me with a generalized trust in the overall scheme of things, revealed a lot of the autopilot I’d been flying on all my life and acquainted me with some parts of myself I’d never noticed before. It didn’t provide me with an easy path to follow, but it did allow me to get over the most difficult spots along the way without becoming discouraged.

I was lucky enough to have the experience outside the proximity of preachers, allowing the profundity to define itself as opposed to being attacked with doctrinal interpretations, which I’d have been vulnerable to during the days following.

Old Jules, what is a man?

A man is an android-like motorized inflatable sex-toy and provider of romance fantasies for generic women.

Old Jules, “It is not reasonable to believe in God simply because of miracles.”
Do you agree or disagree?

It’s reasonable to believe in God, miracles, science, anything you decide to believe. Reasonable, but only in the sense that what you believe doesn’t have any bearing on what is and what is not. What would be more reasonable would be to hold back belief until you actually observe something to suggest a direction without a plethora of equally plausible explanations.

Old Jules, life is so unpredictable. Do you agree? I plan, I organize, I worry, I get disappointed, I cry…BUT, somehow, it ends up being a lot better than I ever expected it to be!

You’re trying to hit a moving target. ‘Planning’ is past tense by its nature – you can’t catch up to the present with it. If you want to hit a moving target you have to lead it.

Old Jules, can you explain”It is in the eye of the beholder.” What does this mean through perception?

Visualize shooting a beer can while it’s facing you lengthwise, bottom through the top. Now stand it on its end and shoot it again. Rotate it in your hand and examine the holes. Does the object look the same, despite the fact they share the similarity of having holes through them?

Now take another can and throw it into the air and shoot some more holes in it, followed by examination.

Reality is a moving target. It rotates, revolves and spins, changing appearance. All it has in common with itself is the fact of a lot of holes you can see through.

You, the beholder.